It’s time for another edition of Shot In The Dark Forecasts! I wouldn’t be doing Anchorage any justice if I didn’t feature them at least once this season. So for February, they get the spotlight to themselves in this SITD forecast. Before we get to that, how did the January forecast fare?

I believed January would be below average for five chosen cities. If that held true, it’d be a Bull’s Eye forecast. Another way to get the Bull’s Eye was if one of the five was below average by a foot or more. 3 or 4 of the cities were below average, with none being a foot or below average, then the forecast was On Target. Below are the totals for those five cities and their averages in parenthesis.

Ann Arbor, MI: 16.8 (13.4)
Colorado Springs, CO: 0.5 (5.1)
Erie, PA: 26.5 (29.8)
South Bend, IN: 35.0 (20.6)
Worcester, MA: 13.6 (17.1)

3 out of the 5 were below average. None of them were lower by a foot or more, so it’s On Target. Of the group, South Bend was the big winner, beating average by more than 14 inches!

So let’s take a look at the standings. Remember that for SITD, an On Target forecast is worth 2 points.

If this was a Bull’s Eye, I’d be right at 1.00. So I am just a bit short with a little more than half of the forecasts to go.

Now for this edition’s forecast, which features only Anchorage, AK. In an average season, Anchorage will get 11 inches in February. But as we the stats show, this has been anything but average for Anchorage. In fact, they’re already almost 30 inches above average for the entire season! I think this above average pattern will continue for them.

Bull’s Eye Anchorage’s February total will be at least triple average for the month.
On Target Anchorage’s February total will be at least double average for the month.
Complete Miss Any other result.

Have a great February everyone!

I was curious to see how the Colorado cities did after getting pounded the last day or two so I did a quick top 10 update. They did pretty good with Denver jumping up to third place adding just over a foot of snow to their totals showing 12.5 inches so far. Ft. Collins picked up another 9.1 inches and Lakewood,Co had 15 inches of the white fluffy gold drop on them.

I was thinking that one of the cities have finally chipped away some snow from Anchorage, Alaska’s totals but low and behold Anchorage goes and sets a date record for yesterday picking up 9.1 inches of snowfall breaking their old record of 5.4 that was set in 1970. Anchorage is the first city to hit the 100 inch mark this season also and has double their normal snowfall totals for this time in the season. We’ll keep an eye on where it’s snowing and update as needed.

HAve a Super Weekend All

According to an article at MSN – The Punxsutawney Groundhog Club made their decree Thursday morning in central Pennsylvania: Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow, and there’ll be six more weeks of winter. The announcement was met with boos from the enormous crowd gathered in Punxsutawney.

My question is what winter? Never mind winter but this whole snow season has been a bust so far. Records of warmer than normal temperatures are being set all over the country most likely. As for snow, what snow? To think people let out gasps and whines when they heard the news seems to go against the way the weather has been so far. I think it should have been whines and gasps if he didn’t see his shadow. That could have ended a good thing, the weather pattern that the US has had so far this winter. For those that don’t like the snow at least.

This by far has been the most boring updates I’ve done since keeping the stats the last couple of seasons.  A few jumps in the slopes here and there but no big snow for any of the cities.  I will agree with the rodent though.  I think within the next 7 – 10 days that jet stream that has been hanging to the north of the US will start dropping and when it does I think it may stick around for a bit.  Hopefully at least through March.  Keep an eye on the Colorado cities as they should be picking up some snow in some of the cities.  If it pans out that they get some decent snow I’ll update them again to see how they gain on Anchorage.

Have a Great Weekend All

It’s time for another edition of Point Blank Range Forecasts. But before the newest outlook is revealed, I have to show how the previous one fared.

The previous prediction involved Seattle, WA, Spokane, WA, Boise, ID and Billings, MT. All four falling in the 6-10 inch range for 2 days would be a Bull’s Eye. 2 or 3 of them in range would be good enough for On Target. Let’s check the totals!

Seattle: 7.1
Spokane: 9.7
Boise: 4.8
Billings: 9.7

For those who are curious, Seattle (6.8 on 1/18) and Billings (9.6 on 1/19) broke snowfall records for the given day while Spokane (6.0 on 1/19) tied theirs.

Boise was the only one that did not fall in range, so that is an On Target prediction!

Still a bit below the 1.00 goal, but at least the average is moving in the right direction…for now. This is the fourth PBR forecast, so after this one there will be 6 remaining. On the SITD side, there will be 3 more monthly outlooks. So overall, we’re basically 40% done with this season’s forecasts.

Now it’s time for this edition’s forecast, featuring Madison, WI, Milwaukee, WI, Minneapolis, MN, Detroit, MI and South Bend, IN.

Bull’s Eye All five of the selected cities will total 1-3 inches of snow through Saturday.
On Target 3 or 4 of the selected cities will total 1-3 inches of snow through Saturday.
Complete Miss Any other result.

Have a great weekend everyone!

With Anchorage, AK having a huge lead as of the last update, it got me thinking about how they would stack up with Syracuse’s totals from last season. I’ll be taking a look at a two different pieces in each post: how the two stack up straight up, and how they each compare to their respective averages. I figure this could be a fun feature throughout the remainder of the season, given how far up Anchorage is. And that’s what got me thinking about this comparison. Anchorage this season has a big lead, like Syracuse did a year ago.

Alright, enough rambling, let’s get to the stats!

Up first, snowfall, as of January 24th.

2011-12 Anchorage: 90.4
2010-11 Syracuse: 111.8

And here’s how far above average those are.

2011-12 Anchorage: 43.6
2010-11 Syracuse: 42.9

Well, hello there! Anchorage is slightly more above average than Syracuse was last season. The two seasons are indeed quite similar.

By the way, this time last year, Anchorage was sitting at 39.1 inches (7.7 below average). This season, Syracuse is currently at 27.6 (42.4 below average).

Just a quick heads up post that all of the cities have finally been updated. More info to come

It’s that time again! I try to keep the regions varied, at least for the first few forecasts, and with snow making its way through the Northwest U.S. I figured it’s the perfect time for that region to join the forecast party.

Before we get into that, here’s a look at how the last forecast went.

Five cities, Cincinnati, OH, Cleveland, OH, Chicago, IL, Indianapolis, IN, and Detroit, MI, were chosen. If all five had snowfall totals between 1-6 inches for Thursday and Friday, that would be a Bull’s Eye. 3 or 4 would be On Target. Let’s see how they stacked up:

Cincinnati: 1.0
Cleveland: 4.6
Chicago: 4.9
Indianapolis: 1.7
Detroit: 1.6

I probably could have toned the range down a bit, but this was about as good of a forecast as I can remember. All five were in range, so that’s a Bull’s Eye!

Not where I want to be yet, but it’s still progress. With that in mind, here’s the next forecast, featuring Seattle, WA, Spokane, WA, Boise, ID and Billings, MT.

Bull’s Eye All four of the selected cities will total 6-10 inches of snow for Wednesday and Thursday.
On Target 2 or 3 of the selected cities will total 6-10 inches of snow for Wednesday and Thursday.
Complete Miss Any other result.

Have a great rest of the week all!

Just did a full update on the snow totals and Anchorage, AK just isn’t looking back to see if anyone is gaining on them. They’ve added around a couple more feet to their snow totals and have almost double the snow as 2nd place Lakewood, Co. Watching the weather channel and some other stations plus getting some comments from people who live in Alaska some of the towns/cities like Cordova, Alaska have received around 18 foot of snow so far this season. No doubt it will be hard to catch Anchorage but there is still plenty of time left in the 2011-2012 season. The only problem is it has to actually stop snowing there for any of our cities to catch up. WTG Anchorage

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Here is some information on Anchorage and Ak that Anne from Alaska posted in a comment.  Thanks Anne

 I am here in Anchorage and as of yesterday we broke all previous records for the amount of snow to date. We have had 81 inches as of yesterday and it is still snowing today. 81 inches is about twice what we normally have to date. In 94-95 we got 77 inches by January 9 and ended up with 120 for the winter. That year was beaten by 1954-5 which got 132.8 inches for the year and only 75 inches by January 9th. I was here in 94-5 and I recall that everyone started worrying about roofs collapsing under the snow. It happened in several places in town including the church down the street from me.
The small towns of Cordova and Valdez are also getting hit with more snow than usual:
www.adn.com/2012/01/10/2256990/cordova-short-of-shovels-as-snow.html.

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The Colorado cities are starting to fall a littl bit but Lakewood, Co still has a nice snow pile seperating them for the 2nd spot on the snow mountain. With this last storm that came across the Great Lakes Erie, Pa was able to catch some of the white fluffy stuff along with several other cities in the northeast.

Syracuse, the snow champ for the last couple of years also managed to sled into the top 10 for the first time this season. They still have a long ways to go though if they want to defend their title of snowiest city in the United States with a population of 100,000 or more. I don’t think I would bet against them just yet as it looks like the cold air may be around for awhile this time. Buffalo, Erie, Rochester and some of the other lake effect snow cities have a decent chance at a big comeback for the fact that the Great Lakes haven’t frozen over yet this season. Last I heard was that Lake Erie was around 40 degrees which means that anytime some colder air comes across the lakes there is a good shot of seeing some lake effect snow pile up. It will be interesting to see how the next few weeks play out.

Hey, Have a Super Weekend All

Anyone remember the last PBR forecast? It was done in mid December. It’s been far too long, hasn’t it?

In that December forecast, I believed at least 3 of the 6 chosen cities (Flagstaff, AZ, Albuquerque, NM, Pueblo, CO, Amarillo, TX Guymon, OK and Wichita, KS) would get at least 6 inches of snow between the 19th and 21st. Here are the snowfall totals for each city:

Flagstaff: 0.0
Albuquerque: 1.4
Pueblo: 10.6
Amarillo: 0.6
Guymon: 7.0
Wichita: Trace

2 out of the 6 met the 6 inch mark, so this goes as a Complete Miss.

Nothing to show, as far as points go. With that in mind,